UC-NRLF 


B    E    flME    b3E 


DIMINUTION 


OF 


WATER  ON  THE  EARTH, 


ANn    ITS 


PERMANENT  CONVERSION 


INTO 


SOLID    FORMS 


DAI: TON.  OHIO; 

PRINTED    AT    THE    DAILY    JOURNAL    ESTAHLISHMENT 

1873. 


A    PAPER 


PRESENTING    FACTS    AND.  SUGGESTIONS    IN    PROOF    OF    THE 

THEORY  OF  THE  GKADUAl^  A^D  CONTmUOUS 

DIMINUTION  OF  THE  QUANTITY  OF 

WATER  UPON  THE  EARTH, 

AND    ITS 

PERMANENT  CONVERSION  INTO 

Solid  Forms  of  Matter. 

PREPARED,  TO  BE  PRESENTED  BEFORE  THE 

"American  Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science," 

AT    ITS    MEETING    IN 

PORTLAND,   MAINE,  IN  AUGUST,  1873, 


By    MRS.    GEO.    W.    HOUK, 


OF  DAYTON,  OHIO. 


/I 


DAYTON,  OHIO: 

PRINTED    AT    THE    DAILY    JOURNAL    ESTABLISHMENT. 

1873. 


LOAM    <JTA'-r 


GIFT 


yK^/y 


The  Decrease  of  Water  Surface. 

The  evidences  of  the  apparent  snbsidence  of  the  water 
level  upon  the  earth's  surface,  have  been  familiar  to  scien- 
tific observers  for  many  centuries ;  and  various  theories 
have  been  advanced,  from  time  to  time,  to  account  for  it. 
Aristotle,  Zanthus,  Omar  in  the  10th  Century,  Leibnitz, 
Calcius,  Vallisneri,  Linn^us,  Buitbn  and  Gessner  are 
among  those  who  have  noted  the  diminished  extent  of 
water  surface  upon  the  earth.  Linuieus  and  some  others 
accepted  the  theory  of  Leibnitz,  that  the  Universal  Ocean 
was  received  into  cavern's  which  opened  in  the  earth's  crust. 

There  seems  to  have  been  no  expression  of  similar  views 
durin tr  the  past  century.  *  Humboldt  says :  •'  We  must  not 
overlook  the  possibility  of  a  diminution  of  the  quantity  of 
water,  and  a  constant  depression  of  the  level  of  the 
seas,  *  -'^  but  in  the  actual  condition  of  our  planet  there 
is  no  direct  evidence  of  a  real  continuous  increase  or  de- 
crease of  the  sea,  and  we  have  no  proof  of  any  gradual 
change  of  its  level."     (Cosmos  11.  p .) 

As  far  back  as  1692,  Ray  wondered,  on  the  other  hand, 
why  the  earth  did  not  proceed  more  rapidly  toward  a 
general  submersion  when  so  nmch  matter  was  carried  into 
it  by  rivers  and  undermined  in  sea  cliffs,  which  tended  con- 
stantly to  raise  the  surface  of  the  waters.  Lyell  adds: 
"Certainly  no  deposition  of  sedinfent  can  occur  without 
the  displacement  of  a  quantity  of  water  equal  in  volume, 
which  will  raise  the  sea  even  to  the  antipodes." 


179 


From  a  knowledge  of  the  incessant  and  immense  deposits 
beneath  the  surface  of  the  waters,  there  shoukl  be,  if  the 
quantity  of  7vater  remained  constant^  a  general  elevation 
of  water  surface,  and  slow  but  certain  advance  of  water 
upon  land. 

The  great  preponderance  of  facts,  however,  goes  to  prove 
that  the  land  surfaces  have  actually  gained  upon  the  waters, 
although  there  are  limited  areas  where  the  sea  is  said  to  be 
encroaching,  as  upon  the  coasts  of  Greenland  and  ^orwaj^ 
and  the  wash  of  cliffs  upon  some  exposed  ocean  shores. 

The  broad  truth  that  every  part  of  the  earth's  surface 
has  at  some  time  been  under  water  is  very  pertinent.  There 
is  evidence  of  the  action  of  water  not  only  at  heights  far 
above  the  sea  level  and  upon  the  interior  of  continents,  but 
the  horizontal  formations,  as  those  of  the  Pyrenees  and 
the  Cape  of  Grood  Hope  prove  the  undisturbed  condition 
of  the  strata. 

The  earlier  deposits  were  more  general  in  character  and 
of  greater  extent,  gradually  diminishing  as  they  advance 
in  time  and  change  in  the  structure  of  their  organic  re- 
mains. Since  the  beginning  of  the  tertiary  period  the  dry 
land  in  the  Northern  Hemisphere  has  been  constantly  on  the 
increase.  The  immensely  powerful  erosive  forces  in  the 
British  Islands,  where  tens  of  thousands  of  feet  of  the  solid 
rock  formations  have  been  washed  out,  leaving  terraces  and 
water  marks  hundreds  of  feet  above  the  present  ocean 
level — the  raised  beaches  sCnd  water  lines  of  Norway, 
Sweden,  France,  Italy,  Greece — the  advance  of  land  around 
the  entire  borders  of  the  Mediterranean  Sea — land  beyond 
Antwerp  left  dry  within  the  historic  period — and  the  well 
known  great  advances  of  all  the  deltas  of  the  large  rivers 
of  the  world — the  glacial  deposits,  proving  the  ^N^orthern 
Oceans  to  have  receded  to  their  present  levels  from  the 
lower  latitudes  of  the  temperate  zones — the  grand  pages  of 
the  great  Stone  Book,  spread  out  upon  every  continent,  bear 
witness  in  unmistakable  characters  to  the  increase  of  land 
surface. 


I 


Altliough  Sir  Charles  Lyell  says  It  is  impossible  to  invent 
any  theory  to  account  for  the  disappearance  of  so  large  a 
body  of  water  as  must  have  diappeared  to  explain  geo- 
logical facts,  he  adopts  that  of  Mr.  Darwin,  of  the  sinking 
down  of  the  ocean  bed;  commenting  upon  Ray's  geological 
views  he  says  "the  preservation  of  the  dry  land  may  some- 
times be  effected  by  the  subsidence  of  that  part  of  the 
earth's  crust  covered  by  the  ocean" — and  again,  "The 
sinking  down  of  the  bed  of  the  sea  is  one  of  the  means  by 
which  the  submersion  of  land  is  prevented" — and  he  adds, 
"if  we  then  inquire  in  what  manner  the  force  of  earth- 
quakes must  he  regulated  in  order  to  restore  perpetually 
the  inequalities  of  surface  which  the  levelling  power  of 
water  is  constantly  tending  to  efface,  it  will  be  found  that 
the  amount  of  depression  must  exceed  that  of  elevation.  If  a 
counterpoise  be  derived  from  this  source,  the  quantity  and 
elevation  of  land  may  forever  remain  the  same,  and  on  the 
other  hand  the  force  of  the  aqueous  agents  themselves  might 
thus  continue  forever  unimpaired.^^ 

This  is  a  persistent  and  systematic  cause  of  usefulness 
that  is  scarcely  to  be  expected  from  earthquakes !  and  is 
really  a  revival  of  the  earlier  cavern  theory  of  Liebnitz,  for 
if  the  ocean's  bed  is  depressed,  it  really  forms  an  abyss  for 
the  superfluous  waters  to  settle  down  in. 

This  means  of  escape  from  a  serious  dilemma  will  not 
bear  the  test  of  close  examination.  In  thus  relieving  the 
surface  of  the  earth  of  the  volume  of  water,  that  must  be 
displaced  by  the  solid  matter  that  is  carried  into  every 
body  of  water  existing  upon  it,  by  the  subsidence  of  the 
bed  of  the  Pacific  Ocean,  the  evaporating  surface  is  con- 
stantly diminished ;  not  a  de]»ta  can  form — or  the  sands  of 
the  sea,  or  the  land  any  where  encroach  upon  the  water 
without  a  decrease  of  evaporating  surface,  unless  a  corre- 
sponding water  area  is  somewhere  else  exposed. 

Evaporation  is  a  very  powerful  physical  agency.  Prof. 
Maury,  in  "The  Physical  Geography  of  the  Sea,"  gave  to 


6 

the  world,  some  3'ears  ago,  a  clear  idea  of  its  wonderful 
power  and  exquisite  operations. 

Although  the  torrid  zone  is  the  principal  evaporating 
area  of  onr  globe,  evaporation  takes  place  from  every  water 
surface  npon  it — varying  in  quantity  according  to  tempera- 
ture, winds,  &c.,  hut  transpiring  even  below  zero,  for  in 
liquid  matter,  as  in  gaseous,  there  is  at  all  times  a  constant 
action  of  repulsive  force,  or  energy,  tending  to  drive  the 
particles  asunder.  This  is  entirely  a  surface  work;  as  water 
acts  only  upon  the  solid  surfaces,  so  the  aerial  forces  act 
only  upon  the  liquid  surfa-ces,  all  the  liquid  matter  beneath, 
being  as  removed  from  the  atmospheric  operations  of 
nature,  as  the  buried  strata  of  the  earth  are  from  aqueous 
and  atmospheric  agencies. 

Therefore,  if  it  is  indeed  true  that  the  land  surfaces  have 
encroached  upon  those  of  the  water  anywhere,  this  change 
in  the  relative  quantities  of  land  and  water  areas,  must 
produce  eflects  of  such  a  marked  and  unmistakable  charac- 
ter as  to  be  discovered  upon  the  continents,  which  receive 
the  aqueous  vapor  evaporated  from  the  water  surfaces  of 
the  seas  which  supply  their  precipitation. 

If  there  is  less  water  surface,  there  will  be  less  evapora- 
tion, less  moisture  in  the  atmosphere,  less  precipitation,  a 
gradual  lowering  of  all  inland  seas  and  lakes — and  con- 
stantly lessening  drainage,  or  smaller  rivers  returning  to 
the  oceans. 

Such  a  slow  but  certain  change  in  physical  conditions 
would  produce  corresponding  changes  in  organic  life,  uni- 
form change  instead  of  "  uniformity  without  change,"  and 
"aqueous  forces  that  would"  not  "remain  forever  unim- 
paired." 

In  studying  the  inland  waters  and  drainage  of  the  con- 
tinents to  determine  whether  there  are  any  proofs  of  a  de- 
crease of  precipitation,  the  salt  lake  regions  afford  the  most 
striking  evidences  of  a  decrease  of  evaporating  surfaces — 
and  it  is  a  significant  fact  that  upon  each  of  the  great  con- 
tinents, and  upon  many  iplands,  there  are  immense  saline 


deposits,  which  are  indirect  proofs  of  a  decrease  of  evapo- 
rating surface.  But  there  are  in  Asia,  Africa,  North  and 
South  America,  still  existing  hodies  of  salt  water  that  hear 
the  most  unmistakahle  witness  to  a  constant  decrease  of 
precipitation  in  their  gradually  lowering  levels. 

It  is  deemed  unnecessary  in  this  paper  to  refer  especially 
to  these  remarkable  localities,  as  their  peculiar  character- 
istics are  too  interesting  not  to  he  familiar  to  all  physicists. 

The  Dead  Sea,  the  most  remarkable  of  these  grand 
evaporation  gauges,  is  about  1,300  feet  below  the  level  ot 
the  Mediterranean  Sea.  The  whole  Aralo-Caspian,  and 
lied  Sea  formations  bear  the  most  undoubted  evidence  of 
u  decrease  of  precipitation  and  constant  lowering  of  water 
level  upon  the  continent  of  Asia. 

Lieut.  Maury  has  demonstrated  such  to  be  the  fact. 

Lake  Tadjara,  the  great  salt  lake  of  Central  Africa,  is 
500  feet  below  the  ocean  level,  and  is  salting  up.  The 
Bahr  Assal,  which  once  formed  its  continuation,  has  shrunk 
to  an  elliptical  basin,  is  half  filled  with  water  of  the  deepest 
cerulean  blue,  and  half  with  a  glittering  sheet  of  sand 
white  salt.  Southern  Africa  is  also  said  to  have  similar 
formations. 

The  lake  of  Utah  is  the  basin  which  receives  the  drain- 
age of  this  inland  North  American  water  shed.  Its  surface 
is  lowering,  its  waters  salting  up,  and  the  channel  which 
once  received  the  excess  of  drainage  and  returned  it  to  the 
ocean  is  distinctly  traceable,  as  are  channels  from  most  of 
the  other  salt  lakes. 

Lake  Titicaca  is  but  slightly  brackish,  and  is  supposed 
not  to  have  been  standing  long  enough  to  show  any  re- 
markable decrease  of  level,  existing  as  it  does  upon  the 
last  emerged  continent  of  South  America. 

If  Maury  has  proved  that  the  water  surfaces  that  supply 
the  precipitation  of  Western  Asia  have  dimkiished  in  ex- 
tent, these  salt  lakes  and  saline  deposits  upon  every  continent 
and  many  islands,  bear  witness  to  the  general  truth  that  the , 
evaporating  surfaces  have  evergwliere  deceased. 


s 


8 

The  value  of  these  bodies  of  inland  salt  water,  as  geological 
loitnesses  of  change,  results  from  their  very  nature.  Saline 
waters  hold  a  large  amount  of  solid  matter  in  solution  and 
mechanical  suspension.  Their  deposits  are  large,  well 
defined  and  unmistakable  in  character.  There  is  in  the 
neighborhood  of  the  Dead  Sea  a  range  of  hills  7  miles  long 
and  300  feet  high,  said  to  be  formed  entirely  of  rock  salt. 
Similar  formations  of  chloride  of  sodium  are  to  be  met 
with  in  all  the  salt  lake  regions,  and  not  only  there,  but 
in  many  places  now  far  removed  from  present  salt  water 
areas.  These  deposits  generally  occur  with  marls,  sand- 
stone, gypsum,  etc.,  and  in  some  cases,  infusoria,  bromides, 
iodides,  iron,  etc.  ai^e  to  be  met  with. 

These  saline  deposits  are  to  be  found  throughout  the 
crust  of  the  earth — "  In  the  British  Islands  in  trias  or  new 
red  sandstone — in  the  oolitic  strata  in  the  Salzburg  Alps — 
with  cretaceous  green  sands  in  Spain — with  chalk  and 
tertiary  rocks  in  the  district  of  the  Pyrenees — and  in  the 
carboniferous  and  older  strata."  "  It  is  thus  the  product  of 
all  ages." 

The  assertion  that  the  present  waters  of  the  earth  may 
have  held  all  this  now  solid  salt  in  solution,  at  different 
times,  cannot  stand  before  the  accumulating  proofs  that 
there  is  actually  less  water  upon  the  earth's  surface  than 
formerly.  It  becomes  indeed  a  proof  that  there  is  less 
liquid — or  water  surface — for  if  this  now  solid  salt  were 
once  again  dissolved,  or  in  liquid  form,  its  increased  surface 
area  would  afford  increased  evaporating  surface.  Only 
pi\re  water  is  evaporated,  all  solid  particles  are  left  behind, 
so  that  if  it  shall  be  proved  that  the  elements  of  pure  water 
have  been  used  in  the  opey^ttions  of  nature,  either  from  the 
evaporated  or  precipitated  waters,  there  must  have  been 
always  upon  every  part  of  the  earth's  surface,  at  every 
period  of  the*  formation  of  the  solid  crust,  an  excess  of 
evaporation  over  preciptation,  gradual  supersaturation  of 
inland  bodies  of  salt  waters  and  their  final  entire  dessication. 


9 

The  existence  of  some  of  the  lower  forms  of  life  through- 
out almost  the  entire  growth  of  the  solid  crust,  since  the 
formation  of  the  lowest  fosiliferous  strata,  proves  that  the 
general  condition  of  the  ocean  waters  have  not  materially 
or  radically  changed.  The  temperature  of  water  has  very 
little  effect  upon  its  power  of  dissolving  chloride  of  sodium, 
hoiling  water  taking  up  very  little  more  than  cold — pure 
water  or  oxygen  and  hydrogen  only  being  used  in  large 
quantities  in  the  vital  processes — the  solid  saline  matter  in 
the  earth's  crust  becomes  a  sort  of  measure  of  the  amount 
of  pure  water  that  has  been  used  up,  or  such  an  amount  as 
would  be  necessary  to  restore  these  saline  and  accompanying 
deposits  to  the  general  condition  of  the  present  ocean  waters. 

The  analysis  of  the  Dead  Sea  water  has  rather  led  to 
the  conclusion  that  there  is  little  probability  that  this  sea 
once  formed  part  of  the  general  oceanic  surface,  and  at 
the  time  of  its  separation  was  of  the  same  general  consti- 
tution— or  that  the  other  saline  continental*  regions  origi- 
nated in  a  general  extension,  and  subsequent  contraction 
of  oceanic  waters.  A  careful  comparison,  however,  of 
Dead  Sea  water — which  may  be  considered  a  representative 
of  this  class  of  formations,  although  apparently  very  dif-^ 
ferent — including  the  contiguous  Dead  Sea  solid  formations — 
and  ocean  water — will  prove  that  this  sea  probably  once 
formed  part  oi;*  the  ocean,  or  at  a  later  period,  of  the 
Mediterranean  Sea. 

The  specific  gravity  of  Dead  Sea  water  is  1227.  In  100 
parts  of  Dead  Sea  water  there  are  26.416,  of  solid  matter — 
while  in  ocean  water,  3.505.  Its  solid  ingredients,  com- 
pared with  those  of  ocean  water,  are  thus  given  by  careful 
analysis : 

DEAD    SEA.  OCEAN   WATER. 

Chloride  of  Magnesium 14.589   360 

"  Sodium 7.855  2.700 

''  Calcium 3,107  

"  Potassium 658  070 

Bromide  "       137  235 

{Sulphate       Lime 070  , 140 

2 


10 

Although  the  proportion  of  these  various  solids  might 
be  thought  to  vary  beyond  all  hope  of  satisfactory  com- 
parison, upon  studying  the  solid  formations  of  the  Dead 
Sea  coast,  the  differences  are  greatly  lessened. 

The  extraordinarily  large  proportion  of  chloride  of  mag- 
nesium in  the  Dead  Sea  may  be  owing  to  the  indefinite 
quantity  that  these  very  dense  salt  waters  are  capable  of 
holding  in  a  state  of  mechanic^  suspension,  and  to  the 
absence  of  organic  life,  which  in  the  ocean  is  constantly 
secreting  this  solid  matter  into  solid  masses.  It  is  certainly 
true,  that  magnesian  limestone  and  gypsum  are  found  as- 
sociated with  rock  salt  here,  as  they  are  all  over  the  world, 
and  that  the  position  of  the  limestone  formations  of  the 
Dead  Sea  indicate  their  deposit  when  its  waters  stood  at 
a  much  higher  level  than  they  do  now,  or  that  they  took 
place  when  they  were  nearly  if  not  exactly  upon  a  level 
with  ocean  waters,  and  were  similar  if  not  identical  in 
(Composition,  and  the  existence  of  marine  polyps  to  create 
such  matter  was  undoubted;  and  such  deposits  continued 
as  long  as  other  conditions  permitted  the  continuation  of 
the  existence  of  this  organic  life,  ceasing  only  with  its  ex- 
tinction. 

The  excess  of  chloride  of  calcium,  as  well  as  the  small 
proportion  of  sulphate  of  lime,  may  be  accounted  for  by 
the  same  absence  of  organic  life  from  the  period  of  the 
supersaturation  of  the  Dead  Sea  with  chloride  of  Sodium. 
This  supersaturation  being  relieved  by  solid  deposits  when- 
ever it  became  excessive — the  enormous  deposits  upon  the 
Dead  Sea  shores  show  why  the  proportion  actually  exist- 
ing in  the  water  is  so  much  less  than  that  of  the  mag- 
nesium. 

If  the  saline  deposits  of  the  continents  bear  such  un- 
equivocal testimony  to  the  decrease  of  general  evaporating 
surface,  the  fresh  water  lakes  should  add  their  more  meao-re 
evidences  in  proof  of  the  same  fact. 

The  North  American  and  other  lakes  do  show  higher 
water  lines  than  those  forming  at  present,  and  lacustrine  or 


11 

fresh  water  silts  occur  upon  every  continent,  and  are  well 
defined;  but  the  very  purity  of  these  fresh  waters  forbids 
large  deposits,  and  they  are  generally  determined  by  the 
peculiar  23lacidity  of  their  formations  and  the  presence  of 
fresh  water  shells. 

Europe,  which  is  the  only  continent  that  has  no  inland 
salt  sea  cut  off  from  oceanic  circulation,  has,  however,  a 
wonderful  witness  to  decreasing  precipitation  hi  the  glaciers 
of  the  Alps,  which  are  said  to  be  of  less  extent  than  for- 
merly; the  ancient  glaciers'  lines  of  erosion  and  deposit 
can  be  distinctly  traced,  notwithstanding  the  obliterating 
eiiects  of  atmospheric  agencies. 

So  remarkable  are  the  evidences  of  glacial  action  in  the 
North  temperate  zone,  l)oth  in  Europe  and  America,  at  a 
period  succeeding  that  of  tropical  warmth  in  the  same 
latitudes,  that  the  glacial  epoch  is  recognized  as  a  distinct 
geological  era,  and  the  causes  which  produced  this  sudden 
change  of  temperature  and  other  physical  conditions  have 
never  been  satisfactorily  explained. 

,  It  is  probable  that  evaporation  may  account  for  it.  If 
there  were  barriers  of  land  or  of  ice  that  cut  off  the 
Arctic  waters  from  free  circulation  with  those  of  the  tem- 
perate zone — and  the  geological  formations  of  the  British 
Islands  indicate  the  removal  of  a  large  body  of  land  there — 
the  tropical  region  being  one  of  excessive'  evaporation 
and  the  North  temperate  and  Arctic  that  of  precipitation 
and  congelation,  there  woukl  have  been  a  rising  of  the 
level  of  Arctic  ices  and  waters  and  a  lowering  of  level  of 
the  waters  of  the  South  temperate  and  torrid  zones,  and 
perhaps  the  emergence  of  land  there.  The  removal  of 
such  barriers  either  by  igneous  or  aqueous  forces,  or  by 
the  decrease  of  precipitation  and  congelation  lowering  ice 
barriers,  and  the  irruption  of  Northern  waters,  icebergs 
and  ice  floes  to  re-establish  the^  lost  level  of  the  waters 
would  account  for  the  glacial  deposits.  The  land  re-emerg- 
ing when  evaporation  once  again  had  given  the  waters  to 
the  advancing  organic  creation. 


12 

"  It  has  long  been  a  matter  of  common  observation  that 
the  rivers  are  cutting  their  channels  through  alluvial  de- 
posits of  greater  depth  and  extent  than  could  have  been 
formed  by  the  present  streams."  Every  individual  whose 
attention  has  been  at  all  directed  to  the  subject,  has  ob- 
'  served  small  streams  where  apparently  larger  ones  must 
have  flowed  at  some  former  period ;  from  the  great  rivers 
that  drain  whole  continents,  to  the  little  streams  that  re- 
ceive the  drainage  from  the  rains  that  fall  upon  the  hills 
and  lowlands  everywhere,  proving  that  some  gradual  de- 
crease in  the  amount  of  drainage  has  taken  place  without 
any  general  disturbing  physical  causes,  which  would  have 
deranged  and  changed  the  ancient  channels. 

The  excess  of  evaporation  over  precipitation,  of  precipi- 
tation over  drainage,  at  all  times  since  the  earliest 
emergence  of  land  upon  the  globe,  results  from  the  fact 
that  part  of  the  aqueous  vapor  develops  vegetable  and 
animal  organisms,  being  incorporated  with  the  vital  tissues 
and  so  cannot  all  be  precipitated  again,  and  part  of  the 
precipitation  is  also  used  in  the  same  way,  and  thus  the 
drainage  cannot  get  all  the  precipitation.  Thus  the 
evaporating  areas  always  receive  less  than  they  give,  and 
must  constantly  decrease. 

For  ambient  air  is  matter,  and  the  seas 

Less  dense  than  earth,  yet  surely  matter  too, 

Ever  as  land  doth  grow,  so  these  decrease, 

Each  type  of  life  the  earth  doth  hide  from  view —  * 

Throughout  the  solid  crust  where  delvers  shew — 

Once  in  the  waters  or  on  land  it  grew. 

Fed  by  the  liquid  and  the  foodful  air 

Ever  in  death  earth's  solid  parts  accrue 

The  fauna  growing  purer  and  more  fair 

Where  richer  floral  growth  the  ancient  rocks  declare. 

And  surely  does  not  many  a  type  below 
Prove  vaster,  warmer  waters,  richer  air  ? 
Beneath  where  now  small  forms  tho'  beautious  grow, 
Man  finds  the  tropic  monster  in  his  lair; 


13 


And  ruin  forests  beyond  earths  compare- 
Creatures  with  ponderous  wings  mid  air  to  soar, 
Wings  needful  then,  not  now,  nor  ever  more. 
Does  not  each  land  declare  "  The  Sea  was  here!^' 
Where  not,  Oh !  Ocean  ?     Thou  wast  everywhere ! 
But  thou  hast  reared  the  earth,  and  never  more 
Can  she  with  all  her  rivers,  what  thou  gavest  restore! 


II. 

Transformation  of  Terrestrial  Matter. 

I 

The  whole  volume  of  matter  which  the  attraction  of 
gravitation  holds  together  in  the  earth  and  its  satellite,  is 
the  same  in  quantity  as  it  was  at  the  time  of  its  separation 
from  the  other  masses  of  the  solar  system,  excepting  the 
insignificant  amount  of  meteoric  matter  which  is  added 
from  time  to  time  to  the  earthly  mass  by  coming  within 
range  of  its  attraction. 

^  If  matter  be  indestructible,  this  must  be  so,  for  those 
forms,  if  such  there  be,  that  can  escape  beyond  this  uni- 
versal law  of  gravitation  are  as  yet  beyond  our  investiga- 
tions.^ We  must,  then,  look  for  change  of  form  only  in  an 
invariable  quantity  of  material  elements. 

Upon  this  truth  Pythagorus  based  his  celebrated  cos- 
mogony more  than  2,500  years  ago. 

The  laws  ^vhich  governed  the  earthly  mass  in  its  first 
separation  from  the  other  masses  of  the  solar  system  were 
the  same  that  govern  it  now,  and  it  must  have  had,  in 
consequence  of  then  existing  temperature  and  other  condi- 
tions, a  certain  volume  as  it  has  now  a  certain  volume  re- 
sulting from  past  and  present  conditions  of  temperature,  etc. 
^  The  first  change  that  took  place  producing  this  separa- 
tion, altered  the  previous  internal  relations  of  this  matter, 
and  if  the  same  laws  continued  to  operate  upon  it,  the 
effect  was  to  produce  something  different  from  that  produced  by 
the  first  change. 

Thus  t^  operation  of  uniform  laws  ivould  i^roduce  constant 
diversity.     In  obedience  to  the  same  laws,  changes  have 


14 


transpired  in  the  forms  of  matter,  through  all  past  time, 
are  still  progressing  and  will  continue,  while  the  present 
laws  and  elements  of  matter  exist,  and  from  a  human 
point  of  view,  these  changes,  have  heen,  are,  and  will  he 
permanent. 

It  is  said  that  the  earth  at  a  certain  point  of  time  after 
its  separation  from  the  sun  "was  no  less  than  482,000  miles 
in  diameter,  heing  60  times  what  it  has  shrunk  to."  * 

If  this  volume  of  matter  was  indeed  so  diffuse,  the  ele- 
ments must  have  existed  in  very  different  forms  from  those 
in  which  thej  now  exist.  As  a  first  attempt  at  forming 
an  estimate  from  scientific  theories  of  the  volume  and  con- 
dition of  the  telluric  mass  at  an  inconceivahly  remote 
period,  it  is  exceedingly  important  and  interesting.  It  ad- 
mits and  confirms  the  great  theory  of  Laplace,  for  from 
our  present  knowledge  of  the  elements  of  matter,  had  the 
volume  of  the  earth  been  so  extended,  the  largest  portion 
of  it  must  have  heen  in  a  gaseous  state. 

"  The  geometrical  form  of  the  earth  itself,  which  indi- 
cates the  mode  of  its  origin  is  in  fact  its  history.  An 
elliptical  spheroid  of  revolution  gives  evidence  of  having 
once  heen  a  soft  or  fluid  mass."  f 

Whether  this  fluid  body  was  the  result  of  chemical  com- 
bination and  condensation  of  previously  gaseous  matter  or 
not,  it  is  another  great  fact  in  the  meagre  positive  knowl- 
edge man  has  been  able  to  acquire  of  the  past  condition 
of  this  sphere ;  if  the  predominance  of  gaseous  matter  was 
implied  by  the  assertion  of  a  diameter  of  the  telluric 
mass,  of  482,000  miles  at  an  earlier  period  of  time,  tlie 
predominance  of  liquid  matter  seems  to  be  proved  by  the 
present  form  of  the  now  partially  solidified  oblate  spheroid. 

No  conception  can  be  formed  of  the  intervals  of  time ; 
but  at  the  period  of  the  first  formation  of  solid  matter 
evident  in  the  earth's  crust,  the  conditions  of  temperature, 
&c.,  must  have  been  such  as  to  permit  solidification  from  a 
former  liquid  state. 


■*Vestiges. 


tCosmos,  Vol.  1.-163. 


15 

That  there  had  been  a  gradual  cc^oling  of  the  whole 
body  up  to  this  time  can  not  be  positively  asserted,  although 
it  is  probably  true;  the  evidences  of  igneous  action  are 
undoubted,  and  still  existing  central  heat  undisputed — but 
the  plane  of  the  earth's  granitic  crust  must  have  cooled  in 
solidifying,  and  must  have  been  still  further  greatly  re- 
duced in  temperature  before  there  could  have  been  any  de- 
posit of  water  upon  it,  even  if  the  elements  had  already 
combined  to  form  aqueous  vapor. 

Of  the  action  of  water  upon  this  earliest  known  forma- 
tion of  solid  matter  there  is  at  length  indubitable  evidence, 
as  there  is  at  a  still  later  period,  of  the  existence  of  an  at- 
mosphere. 

Thus  we  arrive  at  a  point  of  time  when  the  elements 
had  combined  here  into  the  diversified  forms  of  solid, 
liquid,  and  gaseous  matter.  Although  this  presumptive 
reasoning  proves  gaseous  matter  to  have  existed  first,  the 
actual  evidence  of  its  forming  the  earth's  atmosphere  does 
not  appear  until  after  the  creation  of  organic  life  upon  the 
land. 

So  constant  and  permanent  these  forms  of  matter  seem- 
ed to  the  ancients,  that  they  considered  them  the  elements 
of  nature;  hereafter,  the  elements  into  which  they  have 
now  been  analysed  may  also  be  found  to  be  compound. 
The  results,  however,  thus  far  arrived  at  enable  us  to  un- 
derstand many  of  the  processes  of  nature  now  transpiring; 
to  assert  that  there  is  nothing  unreasonable  in  the  extreme 
diffusion  of  the  known  elements  of  matter  to  a  volume  of 
even  more  than  482,000  miles,  nor  of  its  having  had,  at  a 
certain  period,  as  its  condensation  progressed,  an  incon- 
ceivably high  temperature,  and  that  there  will  be  continu- 
ous transformation  and  solidification  until  the  liquid  and 
gaseous  forms  of  matter  are  entirely  solidified,  and  the 
earth  brought  to  the  present  condition  of  the  moon. 

The  conclusion  has  long  since  been  reached  by  astronom- 
ical observation  that  there  is  no  water  and  no  atmosphere 


16 

upon  the  moon's  surface;  nor  can  liquid  matter  exist  in 
the  fissures  of  its  solid  body,  for  the  tendency  of  water  to 
evaporation — all  liquid  matter  acting  in  obedience  to  the 
law  of  repulsive  force,  especially  when  relieved  from  atmos- 
pheric pressure — would  at  once  cause  it  to  take  a  gaseous 
form.  There  is,  however,  as  little  evidence  of  this  form 
of  matter  as  of  the  liquid  itself. 

The  diameter  of  the  telluric  mass,  at  the  time  of  its 
greatest  extension,  is  supposed  to  have  included  the  matter 
of  the  moon.  The  whole  mass  having  the  rotation  that  it 
had  acquired  as  the  circumference  of  the  sun,  as  well  as 
the  individual  motion  that  had  resulted  in  its  separation. 

There  was  in  the  establishment  of  the  earth's  rotation 
no  alteration  whatever  in  its  relation  to  the  sun.  All  tlie 
matter  that  followed  its  attraction  of  gravitation,  still  oc- 
cupied and  moved  in  its  appointed  place  in  obedience  to 
solar  gravitation.  There  was  not  then,  nor  ever  has  been, 
nor  ever  will  be  as  long  as  it  moves  in  its  orbit,  any  change 
in  its  external  relations,  or  in  the  quantity  of  matter,  which 
only  changes  its  form. 

When  the  matter  of  the  moon  moved  in  the  circum- 
ference of  the  earthly  mass,  it  was  composed  of  most  of  the 
elements  of  the  central  body  thrown  promiscuously  toward 
the  circumference  by  centrifugal  force,  there  being  no 
cohesion  in  a  gaseous  body,  and  where  this  w^as  counter 
balanced  by  the  centripetal  force,  forming  a  comparatively 
quiescent  plane  favorable  to  the  action  of  chemical  affinity. 

When  this  action  began  to  produce  internal  or  indi- 
vidual motion,  there  existed  the  same  conditions  through- 
out the  entire  body,  as  well  as  the  same  elements ,  under 
the  control  of  the  sanie  Imvs.  Must  not  then  the  moon 
have  undergone  similar  changes  to  those  which  have  trans- 
pired upon  the  earth  ?  Of  the  same  matter  originally  in  the 
same  condition  and  under  the  oioerations  of  the  same  laws, 
solidification,  through  the  action  of  chemical  and  vital  agencies, 
must   have   progressed   and,  being   so   much    smaller   in 


17 

volume,  have  produced  its  ultimate  entire  solidification,  at 
a  much  earlier  period — and  the  probable  acceleration  of  its 
mean  motion  within  the  period  of  human  observation. 

Whether  the  giving  off  of  heat  and  the  consequent  re- 
duction of  temperature  and  volume  produces  condensation, 
or  whether  the  slower  succeeding  combinations  of  chemical 
affinity  and  finally  of  organic  life  tending  to  solidification, 
results  in  a  reduction  of  temperature  is  a  complex  and  diffi- 
cult question  beyond  the  range  of  the  present  subject — the 
existing  temperature  and  conditions  are  matters  of  fact. 

The  atmosphere,  the  waters,  organic  life,  the  solidifying 
and  solid  crust  of  the  earth  are  for  the  most  part  composed 
of  the  same  elements  of  matter.  To  acquire  any  definite 
idea  of  the  transformations  of  terrestrial  matter  that  have 
resulted  in  the  solidification  of  a  vast  amount  of  native 
gaseous  elements,  through  their  chemical  liquefaction  and 
subsequent  consolidation,  since  the  creation  of  living  or- 
ganisms upon  this  sphere — the  results  of  research  in  several 
branches  of  science  must  be  briefly  collated,  for  these  lose 
their  distinctiveness,  and  seem  to  converge  as  we  draw 
nearer  and  nearer  the  truth  in  investigating  nature. 


III. 

Chemical  and  Geological  Changes. 

There  are  only  thirteen  (13)  of  the  sixty-five  (65)  ele- 
ments, still  supposed  to  be  simple,  that  make  up  the  great 
bulk  of  terrestrial  matter.  Of  these,  only  four  (4)  that  are 
really  important  in  this  connection.  These  are  the  organic 
elements,  oxygen,  hydrogen,  nitrogen,  and  the  non-metallic 
solid,  carbon. 

Oxygen  and  nitrogen  form  the  earth's  atmosphere. 

Oxygen  and  carbon^  the  carbonic  acid  gas  mingled  with  it. 

Oxygen  and  hydrogen^  the  invisible  moisture,  aqueous 
vapor,  and  all  the  water  in  and  upon  the  crust  of  the 
earth.  8 


18 

Oxygen,  carbon,  hydrogen,  and  nitrogen  form  the  whole 
mass  of  the  organic  creation,  living  and  dead,  except  the 
small  amount  which  would  remain  as  ash,  were  such  mat- 
ter consumed  at  a  red  heat. 

Silicon,  alumnium,  magnesium,  calcium,  potassium, 
sodium,  sulphur,  chlorine,  and  iron  are  the  nine  (9)  princi- 
pal inorganic  elements,  and  with  the  two  organic  elements, 
oxygen  and  carbon — hydrogen  and  nitrogen  being  found  in 
small  quantities  in  mineral  masses — make  up  more  than 
1000  <^f  ^^^  solid  crust  of  the  earth. 

Mr.  Dana  happily  calls  these  rock  constituents  "burnt 
compounds" — as  they  are  put  into  stable  conditions  by 
uniting  with  a  saturating  quantity  of  oxygen — and  ordi- 
nary combustion  consists  in  union  with  oxygen  and  the 
formation  of  stable  oxyds. 

The  metals  sodium  and  potassium  burn  if  put  in  contact 
with  water  and  become  oxyds.  Calcium,  by  uniting  with 
oxygen,  becomes  lime;  magnesium,  magnesia;  silicon, 
silica;  and  aluminum,  alumina.  Thus  saturated,  or  united 
with  all  the  oxygen  they  are  capable  of  taking  up,  they 
become  inert  matter,  entering  as  ingredients  into  rocks, 
and  fit  for  dead  nature,  they  are  the  most  refractory  sub- 
stances in  the  earth's  crust — and  excepting  pure  crystalline 
carbon,  the  least  liable  to  change. 

The  primary  or  granite  rocks  of  the  earth's  crust  are 
aluminous  silicates,  being  double  compounds  of  oxygen 
and  silicon;  and  oxygen  and  aluminum;  these  chemical 
compounds  must  have  been  formed  from  a  fused  state. 
There  are  no  means  of  knowing  in  what  condition  the 
silicon,  alumnium,  magnesium,  &c.,  of  the  now  refractory 
burnt  compounds,  existed  before  their  combination;  it 
may  reasonably  be  doubted  w^hether  they  are  not  reall}^ 
compound  substances  formed  during  the  earlier  condensa- 
tion of  matter,  at  all  events  they  or  their  elements  must  at 
some  time  have  existed  in  a  gaseous  state,  and  as  these 
changes  progressed  there  was  a  wonderful  transformation 


19 

oi  a  vast  amount  of  gaseous  to  liquid,  and  liquid  to  solid 
matter.  The  oxygen  must  have  been  ready  for  this  union, 
and  there  must  have  been  an  enormous  supply  of  this  ele- 
ment, for  every  atom  of  the  other  elements  have  been 
consumed  while  the  surplus  of  oxygen  forms  now  at  least 
half  of  the  water,  earth  and  air. 

The  comparatively  quiescent  plane  of  the  earth's  cir- 
cumference would  have  been  favorable  not  only  to  the  action 
of  chemical  affinity,  but  to  rapid  crystalization  and  solidi- 
fication. The  whole  mass  of  overlaying  matter  must  have 
been  gaseous.  The  presence  of  red  heat  or  of  flame  had 
probably  already  efl:ected  the  union  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen, 
the  subsequent  precipitation  of  particles  of  aqueous  vapor 
and  their  conversion  instantly  to  steam  would  have  tended 
to  a  more  rapid  cooling  of  the  overheated  crust.  The 
blare  and  tumult  of  the  elements  during  the  interval  is 
inconceivable.  Aqueous  vapor  condensing  here  and  there, 
the  moment  it  reached  a  higher  altitude,  or  a  cooler 
atmospheric  current,  produced  the  requisite  reduction  of 
temperature,  falling  toward  or  upon  the  glowing  crust  to 
be  forced  instantly  upwards  in  vast  gushing  volumes  of 
steam,  perhaps  decomposed,  and  its  two  gases  reuniting 
with  fearful  explosions  to  reform  aqueous  vapor — external 
as  well  as  internal  forces  rending  and  contorting  the 
shrinking  crust ! 

The  disintegrating  effects  of  steam  are  very  powerful, 
and  must  have  begun  the  work  of  forming  the  gneiss  be- 
fore the  water  rested  upon  the  granitic  base  in  liquid 
masses.  This  deposition  would  have  occurred  at  the  earliest 
possible  period  of  the  requisite  reduction  of  temperature. 
Water  is  the  most  powerful  of  all 'solvents.  "It  absorbs 
and  is  absorbed  by  everything."  This  power  is  greatly  in- 
creased by  an  increase  of  temperature,  so  that  these  pri- 
meval waters  resting  upon  the  granite  not  only  must  have 
had,  but  the  deposit  of  the  gneiss  proves  that  they  did  have, 
power  to  hold  in  solution,  or  in  mechanical  suspension,  all 


20 


substances  whether  simple  or  compound  that  existed  upon 
the  surface  of  the  granite. 

The  first  permanent  deposit  of  liquid  matter  of  the 
primeval  ocean  was  filled  with  the  various  elements  and 
compounds  that  w^ere  to  build  up  and  develop  in  new  forms 
the  succeeding  solid  matter  of  the  earth's  crust.  The  very 
material  of  the  gneiss  swelled  the  bulk  of  liquid  matter. 
The  gradual  cooling  of  the  waters  would  of  itself  decrease 
its  capacity  and  produce  precipitation;  thus  this  first 
merely  mechanical  deposit  altered  both  the  quantity  and 
the  quality  of  the  water. 

The  gneiss  was  a  surface  deposit — all  the  matter  above  it 
was  liquid  and  gaseous.  The  waters  had  free  motion 
everywhere  to  work  upon  and  over  the  granite  in  forming 
it — must  not  then  the  whole  fifteen  or  sixteen  miles  of 
superincumbent  solid  matter  have  come  from  that  ele- 
ment? Wherever  the  granitic  formation  was  covered  by 
the  gneiss,  it  was  at  once  hid  away  to  be  used  no  more  in 
the  operations  of  nature,  unless  by  its  elevation  and  subse- 
quent exposure  upon  the  surface  of  the  earth  it  should 
again  become  subject  to  the  action  of  atmospheric  forces. 
Eut  even  when  now  thus  exposed,  atmospheric  and  aque- 
ous agencies  are  almost  powerless  in  its  disintegration  in 
comparison  with  the  hot  and  saline  waters  and  aqueous 
vapors  of  the  earlier  ages  of  the  world.  To  be  of  any 
use  in  the  operations  of  nature,  in  the  transformation  and 
development  of  terrestrial  matter,  it  must  be  reconverted 
into  mobile  forms,  and  all  the  solid  crystalline  granite  now 
in  the  earth's  crust  is  the  exact  amount  that  has  never 
been  made  use  of  in  any  further  natural  processes. 

The  same  is  true  of  the  gneiss,  only  its  surface  was  ex- 
posed to  the  action  of  the  water  after  its  first  deposition. 
What  remains  is  the  "measure  and  monument"  of  that 
part  of  this  deposit  that  has  been  entirely  withdrawn  from 
the  activities  of  nature. 

"Assuming  that  the  granite  rocks  constitute  the  true 


21 

liypogean  group,  tliat  tlicy  immediately  underlie  and  are 
intimately  associated  with  tlie  lowest  stratified  schists,  we 
obtain  a  starting  point  in  the  crust  of  the  earth  from  which 
to  obtain  an  intelligible  description  of  the  systems  which 
follow." 

The  fact  of  the  strictly  suiface  growth  of  every  deijosit  can 
not  be  too  strongly  pressed ;  every  atom  at  the  time  of  its 
deposition  was  free  to  move  in  obedience  to  the  waters 
•  and  was  left  where  they  carried  it,  upon  the  surface, 
until  they  covered  it  up  with  succeeding  atoms.  The  geo- 
logical strata  of  the  earth  are  monuments  of  those  parts 
of  every  deposit  that  were  thus  covered  away  and  have 
never  been  used  again  in  the  formation  of  subsequent  de- 
posits. 

The  Laurentiaii  and  Cambrian  Systems,  bearing  evidences 
of  preceding  and  continuous  heat  with  traces  of  the  earliest 
forms  of  vegetable  and  animal  life — the  Silurian,  Devo- 
nian, Carboniferous,  Permian,  Triassic,  Oolitic,  Cretaceous 
and  Tertiary  Systems,  are  the  remains  of  each  deposit 
whose  surface  was  used  by  and  incorporated  with  the 
waters  until  the  succeeding  formation  gradually  covered 
it,  and  saved  it  from  further  disintegration.  Reaching  the 
present  surface  of  the  earth,  in  the  post  tertiary  and  super- 
ficial formations,  it  will  be  necessary  to  learn  the  exact 
relation  which  gaseous  and  liquid  forms  of  matter  bear 
not  only  to  the  oxydation  of  metals  and  the  formation  of 
hydrates,  but  to  the  development  of  organized  bodies. 

These  deposits  did  not,  of  course,  all  occur  at  regular  in- 
tervals, in  regular  gradation,  one  above  the  other,  making 
everything  plain  and  easy  to  be  understood.  If  it  had 
been  so,  the  rocks  and  waters  would  have  disclosed  the 
truth  long  since.  All  the  complex  obliterating  and  inter- 
mingling forces  have  been  at  work  from  the  first.  Every 
cause  must  be  allowed  full  weight,  every  efiect  must  be 
^  duly  considered.  Nor  is  the  action  of  igneous  forces 
ignored  wherever  its  effects  are  evident. 


m 

The  earlier  or  lower  strata  appear  to  be  moi*e  general 
and  extensive — the  fossils  of  the  lowest  and  simplest 
forms — those  least  affected  by  changing  conditions  to  ex- 
tend through  the  longest  eras  of  time.  The  later  strata, 
as  well  as  the  later  forms  of  life,  are  more  local  and  limited 
in  area  and  in  time,  and  more  complex  in  character. 

Everything  seems  to  tell  ns,  now  that  w^e  press  the  truth 
so  closely  to  nature,  that  the  rocks  have  been  constantly 
increasing,  as  the  mobile  forms  of  matter  have  been  de- 
creasing in  volume — the  change  transpiring  under  mani- 
fold conditions,  and  over  shifting  and  changing  areas  of 
the  earth's  surface,  and  brought  about  by  the  operation  of 
complex  natural  agencies.  Thus  uniform  laws  have  neces- 
sarily produced  constant  diversity  of  results,  and  to  human 
observation,  permanent  change. 


/m^Mi^  Chanf/ed  into  Solid  Form  by  Acidification,  Alimenta- 

tion  and  Hespiratioyi. 

In  1774,  Lavoisier  showed  that  in  the  calcination  of 
metals  in  the  air,  they  acquired  as  much  weight  as  the  air 
lost.  He  also  found  oxygen  to  be  the  great  agent  in  com- 
bustion, acidification,  calcination,  and  respiration.  All 
these  processes  were  analogous,  and  consisted  in  the  de- 
composition of  atmospheric  air,  and  the  fixation  of  the  pure 
or  vital  portion  of  it.  The  action  of  dilute  acids  on  metals 
was  also  explained  by  the  decomposition  of  water. 

Notwithstanding  an  hundred  years  have  passed  since 
this  discovery,  its  real  bearing  upon  the  physical  history  of 
the  earth  has  never  been  recognized. .  Aerial  or  liquid 
oxygen  changes  its  form  by  acidification  as  well  ^s  by  cal- 


23 

cimation,  and  when  thus  used  the  mobile  forms  of  ^natter  lose 
exactly  the  amount  that  the  solid  or  solidifying  matter  gains. 

Thus  the  using  up  of  the  aeriform  or  liquid  oxygen  must 
have  begun  in  the  formation  of  the  ahiminous  silicates  of 
the  granitic  formations,  and  must  have  continued  through 
all  the  past  building  up  of  the  earth's  crust,  through  the 
agency  of  the  water  and  atmosphere,  the  succeeding  media 
of  the  supply  of  oxygen,  wherever  oxydation  or  acidifica- 
tion have  occurred  to  form  chemical  compounds,  and  where 
these  compounds  have  remained  undecomposed,  they  con- 
stitute part  of  the  matter  once  belonging  to  the  air  or 
oceans,  but  now  forming  part  of  the  solid  crust. 

The  part  that  water  performs  in  these  changes  is  won- 
derful. Anstead  says:  "Water  enters  not  only  into  the 
composition  of  every  solid  and  of  every  liquid  of  which 
every  living  thing  is  composed,  but  is  present  in  all  mineral 
matter;  even  the  most  solid  and  compact  marble  contains 
a  small  percentage  of  water."  "Wherever  change  has 
taken  place  at  great  depths,  there  water  has  acted  as  the 
chief  agent."  "Heat  and  chemical  action  could  do  little — 
they  act  by  and  with  water,  and  thus  produce  their  results." 

"  Tens  of  thousands  of  feet  in  the  earth  a  slow  but  inces- 
sant crystalization  goes  on,  in  which  water  is  entangled, 
and  with  minerals  helps  to  form  a  part  of  the  substance  of 
each  crystal."  "Itself  a  liquid,  it  enters  into  all  solids, 
almost  as  essential  to  solidity." 

The  large  class  of  minerals  known  as  hydrates,  belong- 
ing to  past  as  well  as  present  formations,  contain  a  certain 
proportion  of  "waters  of  crystallization"  as  essential  to 
their,  formation. 

What  they  thus  gain,  the  liquid  mass  of  matter  must 
have  lost.  In  alum,  46  parts  in  100  are  water — in  epsom 
salts,  51 — in  gypsum,  21.  The  opal  in  its  pure  state  is  a 
hydrate  of  silica,  consisting  of  from  90  to  95  per  cent, 
silica,  and  from  5  to  10  water.  All  crystallization  is  indeed 
well  known  to  be  defined  "  as  the  process,  natural  or  artifi- 


cial,  by  which  the  particles  of  liquid  or  gaseous  bodies  are 
converted  into  crystal  or  solid  bodies  of  regularly  limited 
form." 

Matter  can  not  exist  in  solids,  and  at  the  same  time  in 
liquid  or  gaseous  forms — so  that  the  quantity  of  mobile 
matter  must  have  decreased  by  the  amount  thus  used. 

The  same  truth  applies  yet  more  strikingly  in  the  pro- 
cess of  respiration,  and  not  only  of  respiration  but  of  ali- 
mentation. 

All  organic  life  is  entirely  dependent  upon  the  mobile 
elements  of  matter.  The  atmosphere  and  waters  have 
hitherto  been  considered  rather  as  the  media  of  life  than 
as  the  very  material  from  lohich  all  organic  life  has  been  and 
is  made  up.  So  absolutely  necessary  is  water  to  all  organic 
development,  that  it  is  supplied  in  many  different  ways, 
and  in  apparently  inexhaustible  quantities.  It  is  the  very 
food  of  animals  as  well  as  vegetables — nor  is  this  any  the 
less  true  because  small  portions  of  other  elements  are 
used  with  it,  and  absolutely  necessary  to  its  being  able 
properly  to  develop  organized  bodies. 

The  mobile  elements  of  matter  have  been  consumed  by 
every  organism,  from  the  foraminifera  that  fed  upon  the 
warm  waters  of  the  primeval  ocean  to  the  air-breathing 
and  aquatic  creatures  that  swarm  the  air,  the  earth  and 
waters  to-day. 

The  whole  living  creation  holds  such  matter  in  solid  forms 
now — ^having  lost  none  of  the  organic  elements  of  which 
it  is  composed.  Of  the  quantity  of  this  matter  no  idea  can 
be  formed,  except  by  reflecting  upon  the  universality  of 
life.  The  earth,  the  water,  and  the  air  teem  with  living 
germs  and  organisms.  The  larger  forms  of  the  animal 
creation,  and  the  great  masses  of  vegetation,  especially  in 
the  tropics,  strike  the  eye  by  their  immensity  and  extent. 
But  as  throughout  all  nature  the  ideas  of  comparison  be- 
tween great  and  small  are  continually  confounded,  so  when 
we  contemplate  the  immense  extent  and  quantity  of  micro- 


25 

scopic  life,  developed  by  the  researches  of  Ehrenberg, — in 
the  deep  seas,  in  the  earth  itself,  and  in  the  atmosphere — 
covering  and  coloring  even  the  Polar  snows,  and  existing 
in  the  refined  tissues  and  fluids  of  living  creatures,  the 
mind  becomes  bewildered  at  the  infinity  it  encounters  upon 
either  hand,  and  is  profoundly  impressed  witli  this  won- 
derful and  universal  presence  of  vitality. 

Omitting  the  great  mass  of  evidence  as  to  the  way  in 
which  the  elements  of  water  and  air  are  used  in  the  devleop- 
ment  of  both  vegetable  and  animal  organisms,  the  mere 
statement  of  their  constituent  elements  will  be  suflicient. 

Witli  scarcely  an  exception,  vegetable  bodies  consist  en- 
tire! v  of  carbon  and  water,  or  of  the  elements  of  water 
united  with  carbon  in  various  proportions.  AV^oody  fibre 
or  lignin  is  nearly  identical  in  all  trees  and  in  the  fibres  of 
linen  and  cotton.  It  forms  the  trunks  and  branches  of  trees, 
and  all  the  fibrous  or  woody  parts  of  vegetable  bodies — 
making  up  a  large  proportion  of  the  bulk  of  vegetable  mat- 
ter, it  consists  of  50  parts  of  water  and  50  of  carbon. 

The  other  principal  compounds  that  are  developed  in 
the  process  of  vegetable  growth,  are  cellular  fibre,  gum, 
starch,  cane  and  grape  sugar,  these,  with  the  exception  ot 
the  latter  and  lignin,  consist  of  the  same  elements  in  exactly 
the  same  lyopoiilon ! 

Some  of  the  principal  vegetable  acids  and  compound  are 
tljus  represented  by  chemical  symbols: 

Water H'     O 

Carbonic  acid O'C 

Alcohol H«     O^C* 

Ether H^    O    C* 

Acetic  acid H'    O^  C* 

Tartaric  acid H"  0^°  C* 

Sugar H"0"  C" 

Starch H^»  O^"  C^' 

Oxalic  acid 0^  C'^. 

Circle  of  sciences,         408 
4 


26 

"lu  crops  as  they  are  reaped  and  even  as  they  are  given 
for  food,  much  water  is  present;  when  artificially  dried ^ 
carbon  forms  i  their  weight,  oxygen  more  than  J,  hydrogen 
a  little  more  than  5  per  cent.,  and  nitrogen  rarely  to  more 
than  2  J  per  cent." 

When  starch  or  gum  becomes  sugar,  as  in  the  germina- 
tion of  seeds  and  other  vegetable  processes,  the  transmuta- 
tion is  effected  by  the  absorption  of  water;  for  with  regard 
to  their  composition,  a  greater  proportion  of  water  only 
distinguishes  sugar  from  starch,  and  the  separation  of 
oxveren  from  su2:ar  causes  it  to  be  converted  into  fat  I 

In  the  ripening  of  fruit,  the  cane,  is  converted  into  grape 
sugar,  by  the  absorption  of  additional  oxygen.  There 
seems  to  be  some  deficiency  in  this  supply,  or  difficulty  in 
some  seasons  in  the  vine  getting  the  proper  quantity  at  the 
proper  time,  which  causes  grapes  to  rot  upon  the  vines 
about  the  time  that  their  growth  is  attained,  and  they 
should  begin  to  fill  out,  acquire  some  sweetness  and  ulti- 
mately ripen. 

Animal  food  consists  mainly  of  vegetable  products,  these 
assimilate  the  organic  elements  directly  from  their  great 
liquid  and  gaseous  reservoirs,  and  prepare  them  for  the 
consumption  of  the  animal  creation. 

The  model  man  of  Professor  Quetelet,  weighs  154  lbs., 
and  consists  of 

116  lbs.  of  water, 
38       "        drv  matter. 


154 

Of  the  dry  matter,  24  lbs.  are  fiesh  and  fat, 

14         *<       bone, 

38 


27 


v 


Tlie  dry  matter  consisted  of  28  lbs.  of  organic  elements, 

10        "      inorganic       " 

So  that  there  were  altogether  144  lbs.  of  oxygen,  carbon, 
hydrogen,  and  nitrogen,  to  10  of  all  others. 

If  100  lbs.  of  human  blood  be  rendered  perfectly  dry,  it 
will  be  reduced  in  weight  to  something  less  than  22  lbs. ; 
and  this  dry  matter  consists  of  essentially  the  same  siil)- 
stances  as  the  several  varieties  of  animal  and  vegetable 
food. 

100  parts  of  blood  contain 

93  per  cent,  of  fibrine,  albumen,  etc., 
2     "  "       fat,  sugar,  and  starch, 

5     "  "       saline  or  mineral  matter. 

100  parts  of /?6n7ig  contain 
54.454  of  carbon, 

7.069    '^  hydrogen, 
15.762    "   nitrogen, 
22.715    "   oxygen,  sulplinr,  phospliorus. 

100.000 

100  parts  of  albumen  contain 
55  of  carbon, 

7    "    h^^drogen, 
15    "    nitrogen, 
23    "    oxygen. 

100.000 

Sugar W  O''  C* 

Starch R''  0'«  C'-' 

Fat H^^O^  C^"' 

It  seems  very  singular  that  the  solid  matter  of  animals 
should  contain  nearly  the  same  quantity  of  water  as  the 
liquid  blood;  but  it  is  a  still  more  striking  fact,  that  the 
dry  animal  matter  that  remains,  when  lean  muscular  fibre 
and  blood  are  fully  dried,  has  the  same  composition : 


28 


DRY  BEEF. 

DRY  BLOOD. 

51.83 

of 

carbon, 

51.96 

7.57 

u 

hydrogen, 

7.25 

15.00 

ii 

nitrogen, 

15.07 

21.37 

ii 

oxygen, 

21.30 

4.23 

ii 

ashes. 

4.41 

100.00  100.00 

Other  parts  of  animals,  wood,  hair,  skin,  &c.,  are  com- 
posed of  the  same  elements,  with  less  inorganic  matter; 
horn  containing  only  .07  per  cent,  of  ash. 

It  will  doubtless  be  admitted  without  the  presentation 
of  any  further  argument,  that  the  whole  body  of  mobile 
matter,  as  existing  in  the  atmosphere  and  waters  of  the 
earth,  has  been  diminished  by  the  whole  amount  yielded 
to  the  existing  living  creation.  There  is  less  water  and 
less  atmosphere  since  these  living  organisms  grew.  If  the 
sum  of  the  whole  be  greater  than  any  of  its  parts,  or  a  part 
can  not  equal  tlie  whole,  this  must  be  true. 

But  it  may  be  said  these  bodies  will  decay,  and  their 
elements  will  then  be  restored  to  their  original  mobile 
forms.  The  processes  which  renovate  the  earth  are  by  no 
means  so  simple ;  "  thousands  of  carcasses  and  whole  forests 
of  drift  timber  are  buried  every  year,  and  perhaps  so 
buried  as  to  be  imprisoned  for  whole  geological  epochs." 

Bodies  in  water  change  slowly,  and  in  the  earth  still 
more  so.  Professor  Winchell,  one  of  the  most  advanced 
geologists  of  the  age,  "doubts  whether  the  requisite  con- 
ditions of  oxydation  exists  at  great  depths  in  the  soil." 
"It  needs  only  a  tine  covering  of  such  deposits  as  are  con- 
stantly taking  place  in  the  oceans  and  at  the  mouths  of 
rivers  to  bury  them  away  and  prevent  further  decay." 
Upon  the  Siberian  plains,  and  in  the  ices  of  the  !N"orth, 
dead  bodies  have  been  discovered  so  entirely  unchanged  as 
to  be  greedil}'  devoured  by  dogs.  ^N^ative  timber,  with 
seeds,  and  even  leaves  and  fruits,  is  found  a  very  remark- 


29 

able  state  of  preservation,  after  huudreds  of  years  of 
burial  or  submersion  in  lakes  and  swamps  or  marshes. 
The  more  closely  these  deposits  are  studied,  the  more 
enormous  they  are  found  to  be.  In  the  tropical  regions 
organized  bodies  decay  rapidly,  but  above  45  degrees  of 
of  latitude,  vegetable  matter  begins  to  accumulate  in  vast 
quantities,  and  animal  bodies  to  be  more  frequently  pre- 
served. 

''The  quantity  of  timber  which  is  conveyed  from  the  land 
to  the  sea,  by  the  sinking  of  ships  of  a  large  size,  is  enor- 
mous, for  it  is  computed  that  2,000  tons  of  wood  are  re- 
quired for  the  building  of  one  74  gun  ship ;  and  reckoning 
50  oaks,  of  100  years  growth,  to  the  acre,  it  would  require 
40  acres  of  oak  forest  to  build  one  of  these  vessels."  The 
amount  of  organized  matter  thus  preserved  can  only  be 
conceived  by  a  knowledge  of  naval  statistics. 

Even  where  an  organized  body  seems  to  be  entirely  de- 
composed— part  of  it  returning  to  gaseous  and  part  to 
liquid  form — solid  parts  of  it  may  be  washed  away  and 
buried  so  as  to  remain  undecomposed  for  ages,  for  if  they 
do  change  thus  buried  away,  it  will  be  but  a  molecular 
change  that  can  not  restore  to  their  original  forms  their 
liquid  or  gaseous  elements  of  matter. 

The  processes  of  petrefaction  are  as  yet  but  very  imper- 
fectly understood.  It  is  more  than  probable  some  subtle 
chemical  or  atomic  change  takes  place  in  the  internal 
structure  of  fossil  remains.  The  formation  of  flints,  ap- 
parently upon  the  nucleus  of  an  organic  body  upon  the 
floor  of  the  seas,  at  various  epochs  during  the  chalk  de- 
posits, is  remarkable  and  suggestive.  It  is  said  b}'  Mr. 
Johnston  that  stale  bread  contains  exactlv  the  same  amount 
of  water  as  fresh  bread — about  one  half — but  that  its  liard- 
ening  is  caused  by  molecular  change,  and  not  by  evapora- 
tion or  the  removal  of  any  of  its  elements.  This  may  be 
considered  an  inapt  and  homely  illustration,  but  if  such  a 
change  transpires  in  the  open  air  where  the  elements  would 


30 

be  perfectly  free  to  escape,  is  it  likely  that  buried  organized 
bodies  could  easily  release  their  elements?  More  probably 
they  undergo  some  similar,  internal  change,  varying  ac- 
cording to  the  adjacent  elements  or  compounds,  amount  of 
pressure,  &c. 

Thus  every  passing  generation  of  organic  life  has  proba- 
bly left  traces  of  the  matter  that  once  formed  it,  incorpo- 
rated with  the  solid  strata  of  the  earth's  crust.  Of  the 
relative  amount  of  such  matter,  no  idea  can  be  formed. 
All  the  dead  organisms  as  yet  undecomposed — all  organic 
fragments,  and  all  coral  and  indusial  formations  hold  mo- 
bile elements  in  solid  form ;  if  this  were  not  true,  we  should 
have  no  organically  enriched  soils,  no  deposits  of  guano, 
no  peat  or  coal  formations,  no  shell  or  bone  beds,  no  or- 
ganic remains  in  the  crust  of  the  earth. 

Bat  these  we  have.  The  rocky  tablets  of  the  crust  disclose 
these  organic  remains  throughout  their  entire  depth. 
Aqueous  and  fossiliferous  have  become  synonymous  as  ap- 
plied to  the  earth's  strata. 

The  question  as  to  how  much  matter  has  thus  changed 
form  will  depend  upon  future  investigation,  a  better  un- 
derstanding of  mineralization,  a  more  careful  analj^sis  of 
fossil  organic  remains,  and  accurate  comparisons  of  the 
relative  areas  of  land  and  water  at  different  geological 
areas,— a  work  happily  begun. 

Whenever  organic  remains,  either  those  of  recent  date 
or  of  the  most  ancient  strata,  are  exposed  to  disintegration 
and  decomposition,  they  are  in  a  condition  to  be  returned 
to  their  original  elements.  When  coal  is  burned,  the  mat- 
ter the  atmosphere  and  water  lost  thousands  and  thousands 
of  years  ago,  they  thus  once  again  receive ;  so  with  the 
washing  of  salt  beds  and  other  solid  deposits,  the  mobile 
elements  of  matter  only  recover  this  small  fraction  of  the 
entire  amount  thev  previouslv  lost. 


31 


V. 

Change  in  Specks  and  in  Hunian  Hisfonj  and  Development. 

Mr.  Darwin's  tlieory  of  evolution,  or  "the  origin  of 
species  by  natural  selection,"  as  an  independent  scientific 
theory,  has  seemed  from  the  first  inadequate  to  explain  the 
(jrand  ayid  systematic  series  of  changes  that  have  brouglit  tlu5 
countless  varieties  of  species  that  now  exist  upon  the  earth, 
to  tlieir  present  condition. 

The  gradual  revolution  produced  by  the  continual  tranrs- 
mutation  of  matter,  is  the  great  corresponding  cosmical  cause 
of  change  that  has  gicen  direction  to  the  operation  of  natural 
selection^  unfitting  the  earth  at  every  period  of  past  time, 
for  the  continuation  of  the  propagation  of  identical  organ- 
isms— save  such  as  are  of  the  simplest  possible  structure. 

The  strongest  individuals  of  existing  species  adapt  them- 
selves to  changing  conditions,  not  only  slowly  varying  witli 
them,  hut  improving  and  attaining  a  higher  state  of  develop- 
ment. Other  grades  of  physical  powers,  adapting  them- 
selves more  or  less  perfectly  to  altering  external  circum- 
stances, the  weaker  dying  off  as  fast  as  it  becomes  impossible 
for  them  to  adapt  themselves  to  any  further  change.  Past  con- 
ditions never  returning,  there  can  never  ])e  a  return  to  past 
types ;  and  the  various  peculiarities  long  observed  in  the 
nature  of  succeeding  organic  remains  in  the  earth's  crust, 
will  be  explained  by  this  theory — while  other  branches  of 
science  will  be  found  to  be  involved  in  such  a  general 
cause  of  change,  and  it  is  hoped  will  be  advanced  by  its 
promulgation. 

It  is  the  ''kyioivn  cause''  by  which  "stations"  must  un- 
questionably be  modified,  pfroducing  changes  every  where  over 
the  whole  earth,  at  every  period  of  time.  These  transmuta- 
tions are  gradual,  the  cause  that  produces  them  must  act 


32 


gradually ;  tliey  have  been  permanent,  the  cause  must  have 
been  constantly  modified  by  them,  operating  gently  and 
gradually,  from  moment  to  mement,  year  to  year,  age  to 
to  age,  imperceptible  always  at  every  inesent  period  of  time. 
Imperceptible  to-day,  such  change  must  nevertheless  be 
transpiring;  and  there  are  few,  when  the  idea  is  once  pre- 
sented and  reflected  upon,  who  will  not  perhaps  recall 
some  corroborating  evidences  of  its  truth,  even  within  the 
range  of  their  own  experience  or  observation. 

This  wonderful  svstem  of  chano^e  extends  not  onlv 
through  the  inferior  organic  creation,  but  includes  man, 
his  histor}',  his  intellectual  and  spiritual  development. 
These  higher  faculties,  however  superior  to  his  merely 
physical  powers,  are  certainly  dependent  upon  them,  and 
upon  external  conditions,  during  the  life  of  this  physical 
organization. 

Whatever  may  be  thought  now  of  the  connection  be- 
tween vital,  electric,  and  nervous  or  brain  phenomena,  and 
the  subtle  gases,  hydrogen  and  nitrogen,  the  usual  if  not 
constant  presence  of  one  of  these  at  least,  when  electrical 
phenomena  occurs,  artificially  or  naturally,  and  the  myste- 
rious but  constant  presence  of  the  other  in  vital  germs  and 
organisms,  together  with  their  frequent  interdependence,  is 
certainly  worthy  of  consideration. 

"  The  electricity  of  the  atmosphere,  whether  considered 
in  the  upper  or  the  lower  strata  of  clouds,  in  its  silent, 
problematical,  diurnal  course,  or  in  the  explosion  of  the 
lightning  and  thunder  of  the  tempest,  appears  to  stand  in  a 
manifold  relation  to  all  j)henomena,  of  the  distribution  of  heat, 
of  the  pressure  of  the  atmosphere,  and  its  disturbances  of 
hydrometric  exhibitions,  and,  probably,  also  of  the  magnetism 
of  the  external  crust  of  the  earth.  It  exercises]a  powerful  in- 
fMcnce  on  the  ivhole  animal  and  vegetable  world,  not  merely  by 
meteorological  processes,  as  precipitation  of  aqueous  vapors, 
and  of  acids  and  ammonical  compounds,  to  which  it  gives 
rise,  but  also  as  an  electric  force  acting  directly  on  the  nerves, 
and  promoting  the  circulation  of  the  organic  juices. 


33 

"  This  is  not  a  place  in  wliieli  to  renew  the  discussion  that 
has  been  started,  regarding  the  actual  source  of  atmospheric 
electricity  when  the  sky  is  clear,  a  phenomenon  which  has 
been   alternately  ascribed   to  the  evaporation  of  impure 
liquids  impregnated  with  earths  and  salts,  to  the  growth  oj 
plants,  or  to  some  other  chemical  decomposition  on  the  surface 
of  the  earth,  to  the  unequal  distribution  of  heat  in  the  strata 
of  the  air,  and  finally,  according  to  Peltier's  intelligent  re- 
searches, to  the  agency  of  a  constant  charge  of  negative  elec- 
tricity in  the  terrestrial  globe.     Limiting  itself,  to  the  results 
•  yielded  by  the  electrometric  observations,  such,  for  instance, 
as  are  furnished  by  the  ingenious  electro-magnetic  aparatus 
first  proposed  by  Colladon,  the  physical  description  of  the 
universe  should  merely  notice  the  incontestable  increase  oj 
the  intensity  of  the  general  positive  electricity  of  the  atmosphere, 
accompanied  by  an  increase  of  altitude,  and  the  absence  of 
trees,  its  daily  variations,  at  its  variations  at  different  seasons 
of  the  year,  at  different  distances  from  the  equator,  and  in  the 
(lifterent  relations  of  continental  and  oceanic  surface.     The 
electric  equilibrium  is  less  frequently  disturbed  where  the 
aerial  ocean  rests  upon  a  liquid  base,  than  ichere  it  impends 
over  land,  and  it  is  very  striking  to  observe  how  in  exten- 
sive seas,  small  insular  groups,  efl:ect  the  condition  of  the 
atmosphere  and  occasion  the  formations  of  storms,  &c." 

"  The  term  climate,  in  its  most  general  sense,  indicates 
all  the  changes  in  the  atmosphere,  which  sensibly  effect 
our  organs,  as  temperature,  humidity,  variations  of  the  baro- 
metrical pressure,  the  calm  state  of  the  air,  the  action  of 
opposite  winds,  thQ  amount  of  electric  tension,  the  purity  of 
the  atmosphere,  or  its  admixture  with  more  or  less  gaseous  ex- 
halations, and,  finally,  the  degree  of  ordinary  transparency 
and  clearness  of  the  sky,  which  is  not  only  important  with 
respect  to  the  increased  radiation  from  the  eartli,  the  organic 
development  of  plants,  and  the  ripening  of  fruits,  but  also 
in  reference  to  the  feelings  and  mental  condition  of  man,'" 
<*  The  processes  of  the  absorption  of  light,  liberation  of 

5 


34 

heat,  and  the  variations  in  the  elastic  and  electric  tension,  and 
in  the  hygrometric  condition  of  the  vast  aerial  ocean,  are  all  so 
intimately  connected  together,  that  each  individual  meteoro- 
logical process  is  modified  hy  all  the  others,  and  these  mete- 
orological processes  of  the  atmosphere  are  the  controlling  causes 
on  w^hich  depends  the  agricultural  and  pastoral  pursuits  of 
the  inhabitants  of  extensive  tracts  of  continents." 

It  can  but  be  concluded,  from  these  ideas  so  forcibly  and 
fully  expressed  by  the  profound  and  acute  author  of  Cosmos, 
that  electricity  is  in  some  way,  not  yet  understood,  not 
only  intimately  connected  with,  but  dependent  upon  the* 
operations  of  nature  as  explained  by  the  gradual  diminu- 
tion of  the  mobile  forms  of  matter,  and  that  some  of  the 
organic  chemical  elements  must  be  concerned  in  electric 
phenomena. 

According  to  Whewell,  'Hhe  identity  of  electric  and  chem- 
ical forces  is  a  ivell  proved  truth,  from  which  future  specu- 
lations must  advance  as  a  starting  point."  The  identity  of 
organic  aud  chemical  elements  being  also  an  admitted 
truth — the  identity  of  chemical,  vital,  electric  and  nervous 
forces  can  not  be  denied. 

Terrestrial  physical  conditions  must  have  been  so  far 
modified,  and  the  formation  of  solid  matter  upon  this 
sphere  must  have  proceeded  to  a  certain  extent  when  or- 
ganic life  began  to  exist  upon  it.  This  organic  life  must 
have  advanced  with  physical  conditions  through  age  upon 
age  of  change,  during  the  wdiole  formation  of  the  rocky 
strata  of  the  earth's  crust,  before  the  period  arrived  for  the 
present  highest  type  of  physical  organization,  combined 
with  the  highest  development  of  nervous  or  brain  power 
as  existing  in  man,  to  take  its  appointed  place  in  the  crea-^ 
tion  of  God.  There  must  have  been  the  same  fitness  and 
adaptation  in  and  between  organic  and  inorganic,  animate 
and  inanimate  nature,  always.  If  these  gradual  changes 
in  the  forms  of  the  matter  of  this  globe  have  taken  place, 
the  perfect  adaptation  of  all  things  at  all  times  can  not  be  too 


35 

strongly  realized.  At  a  certain  period  of  time,  in  tlie  be- 
ginning of  this  development,  the  snbtler  known  elements, 
of  matter — hydrogen  and  nitrogen — eUiding  in  part  the 
great  law  of  gravitation,  or  solidification,  began  to  gain  in 
quantity  on  the  other  grosser  elements  of  gaseous  and 
liquid  matter — the  carbon  and  oxygen  that  were  helping 
so  ceaselessly  to  build  up  the  adamantine  crust;  these 
mysterious,  chemical,  vital,  and  nervous  forces,  performing 
the  more  exquisite  work  of  operating  with  ever  increasing- 
vigor  or  intensity  upon  the  nervous  centres  of  the  advanc- 
ing animal  creation,  culminating  in  intellectual  powei*. 
Xervous,  and  ultimately  mental,  development  must  have 
progressed  under  changed  physical  conditions,  just  as 
physical  development  had  gone  on — the  various  elements 
doing  their  appointed  work  in  one  case  as  in.  the  other. 

If  the  now  arid  wilds  of  Aral)ia.or  Ethiopia,  was  the 
seat  of  the  earliest  civilization  of  the  earth,  the  apparently 
rapid  change  in  phj^sical  conditions  there,  must  liave^ tended 
to  its  speedy  culmination  and  subsequent  untitness  for 
further  development,  and  the  same  stimulus  of  change, 
may  have  produced  the  development  of  civilization  of  the 
neighboring,  and  ultimately  of  the  Western  nations. 

Whatever  the  descent  of  man  has  been,  every  change 
has  transpired — through  all  the  past — in  perfect  accordance 
with  the  laws  of  God,  as  revealed  to  man.  The  liabita- 
tions  and  races  of  man  changed  perhaps  in  the  earliest 
human  epoch,  somewhat  as  the  habitations  and  species  ol 
other  genera  of  organic  beings  changed.  His  increased 
knowledge  gives  more  and  more  power  to  overcome  the 
diversities  of  changing  climates,  and  all  other  external  dis- 
advantages of  place  and  surroundings. 

Races  and  nations  that  do  not  develop  and  improve,  and 
thus  adapt  themselves  to  changing  physical,  political  and 
social  conditions,  doubtless  becoming  weaker,  and  perhaps 
extinct;  while  those  that  are  brought  to  a  more  perfect 
state,  their  mental  and  spiritual  faculties  being  constantly 


developed — for  the  age  of  the  strongest  physical  develop- 
inent  is  doubtless  passed — will  hooome  the  progenitors  ot 
i nobler  descendants. 

The  rapid  brain  or  nervous  development  of  the  American 
[people  is  not  alone  the  result  of  antecedent,  hereditary, 
(historical,  or  political  causes.  Physical,  external,  condi- 
tions are  operating  with  and  upon  these  with  immeasure- 
able,  irresistable  power;  hygrometrical,  electrical,  and  other 
conditions  are  producing  results  than  can  only  be  surmised 
as  yet;  we  can  not  grasp  or  understand  them.  For  this 
sequence  of  thought  carries  us  beyond  the  seen  and  tangi- 
ble, but  not  beyond  that  lohich  really,  actually  exists.  The 
subtle,  invisible,  intangible  gases  are  as  truly  matter  as 
iron  is  matter.  Oxygen,  hydrogen,  and  nitrogen  we  can 
neither  see,  touch,  taste,  or  smell  in  their  native  state.  To 
our  physical  senses,  though  they  had  always  existed  right 
around  us,  yet  unconlined,  they  had  been  to  us  as  though 
they  ivere  not.  In  their  chemical  combinations,  by  experi- 
ments and  observation  of  their  effects,  man  has  been  able 
to  learn  not  only  of  their  existence,  but  something  of  their 
properties.  He  finds  oxygen  existing  everywhere,  in  every- 
thing; in  vast  quantities  in  solid  forms,  as  well  as  well  as 
liquid  and  gaseous ;  hydrogen  united  w^ith  oxygen  in  liquid 
torm;  nitrogen  mingled  with  gaseous  oxygen.  Hydrogen 
and  nitrogen  are,  however,  most  abundant  in  their  native 
mobile  forms;  they  are  i/iore  ahundant  in  living  organisms 
than  in  dead;  ytiore  in  dead  bodies  than  in  fossil  remains; 
they  are  found  in  very  small  quantities  in  the  geological 
strata  of  the  earth,  in  proportion  to  the  solid  oxygen  and 
carbon,  although  in  sufficient  quantity  to  effect  its  electrical 
condition. 

If  gaseous  and  liquid  matter  has  solidified  in  that  trans- 
formation, certain  ^9ar^5  of  the  subtle  gases,  nitrogen  and 
hydrogen,  that  existed  with  the  oxygen  before  its  solidifi- 
cation, have  disappeared.  Where  are  they?  Do  they  not 
probably  exist  in  proportionally  increased  quantities  in  a 


37 

free  or  gaseous  state,  possibly  in  combination  with  yet 
more  subtle,  unknown  elements  ?  If  they  existed  in  forms 
that  man  could  take  cognizance  of,  if  he  could  follow  them 
further,  he  could  analyse,  study  them,  and  perhaps  under- 
stand their  nature  and  operations;  as  it  is,  he  has  been 
able  to  follow  them  beyond  the  range  of  his  pliysical  senses, 
and  probably  to  their  gradually  increased,  and  increasing, 
proportional  quantities  in  the  earth's  atmosphere,  througlv 
the  action  of  organic  agencies,  is  to  be  ascribed,  together 
with  other  causes,  the  increase  of  electrical  intensity  in 
the  atmosphere,  and  other  electrical  phenomena,  mental 
activity,  and  spiritual  susceptibility. 

These  subtle,  gaseous  elements  are,  as  it  were,  the  con- 
necting links  between  the  seen  and  the  unseen,  the  tangi- 
ble and  intangible,  material  and  immaterial,  temporal  and 
eternal  things,  and  they  can  but  be  involved  in  the  pro- 
cession of  physical  changes  proceeding  to  their  legitimate 
results,  in  the  actual  sequence  of  nature,  with  the  more 
ponderable  elements  of  matter,  putting  mankind,  it  may 
be,  into  communion  with  "those  things  which  are  above*' 
titting  him  more  and  more  to  receive  the  inspiration  of 
His  Spirit,  and  to  learn  of,  and  adore,  the  Great  Creator  ot 
the  Universe,  who  has  made  all  things  by  the  word  of  His 
Power. 

The  thought  of  the  gradual  diminution  of  water,  the 
most  wonderful,  glorious,  beautifying  and  gladdening  ot 
all  'terrestrial  substances,  can  but  be  painful  to  us,  consti- 
tuted as  we  are. 

But  the  same  Almighty  and  Omniscient  Power  that  has 
continuously  controlled  and  moulded  the  adaptations  of 
the  pliysical  universe  to  the  perceptions  and  welfare  of 
sentient  beings,  opening  to  us  even  in  our  own  short  lives 
new  and  unconceived  sources  of  pleasure,  with  the  develop- 
ment of  our  physical,  intellectual  and  spiritual  faculties, 
will  doubtless  still  continue  to  preserve,  between  the  living 
races  of  His   creatures  and  external  physical  conditions, 


that  perfect  adaptation  that  has  always  existed,  and  that 
seems  to  be  an  endless  and  progressive  amelioration. 

That  matter  has  thus  developed  under  His  own  immuta- 
ble laws  for  countless  ages,  with  faultless  precision,  in  the 
vastest  operations  of  the  stupendous  universe,  and  unerring 
perfection  in  the  minutest  details  of  everything,  is  one  ot 
the  most  glorious  of  His  revealed  attributes.  And  we  can 
not  doubt  that  this  revelation  will  become  more  and  more 
irlorious,  even  to  the  far  distant  future,  foretol^lSOO  vears 
ago  by  the  Beloved  Disciple,  who  "  saw  a  new  heaven  and 

A  NEW  EARTH,  AND  THERE  WAS  NO  MORE  SEA." 


39 


Note. — The  matter  of  this  paper,  as  originally  prepared,  was  made  up  in  great 
part  of  extracts  and  illustrations  from  standard  authorities,  exhibiting  physical 
facts  so  collated  as  to  demonstrate  the  theory  of  the  gradual  diminution  of 
water. 

This  abstract,  having  been  made  to  present  to  "The  American  Association 
for  the  Advancement  of' Science,"  the  most  general  and  important  ideas  upon 
the  subject,  with  the  necessary  and  required  brevity,  may  be  found  deficient  in 
clearness,  or  proper  arrangement,  or  in  the  illustrations  necessary  to  a  complete 
demonstration. 

It  has  been  difficult  for  an  unpractised  author,  in  so  condensed  a  summary  of 
a  very  extensive  range  of  facts,  to  prepare  a  paper  that  will  be  suitable  to  the 
occasion. 

A  large  number  of  valuable  authorities  have  been  freely  used  in  the  course 
of  these  investigations — and  are  gratefully  acknowledged.  The  most  important 
of  them  will  be  found  in  the  following  list: 

Cosmos,  Vestiges  of  Creation,  Plurality  of  Worlds,  Origin  of  the  Stars 
(Ennis),  Planetary  and  Stella  Worlds,  Astronomy  of  the  Bible  (Mitchell), 
Elements  of  Astronomy  (Davis),  Ecce  Coelum,  Kitto's  Encyclopedia,  American 
do.,  Malte  Brun,  Whewell's  History  of  the  Inductive  Sciences,  Lyell's  Principles 
of  Geology,  Manual  do.,  Antiquity  of  Man  (Lyell),  Descent  of  Man  (Darwin), 
Origin  of  Species,  do.,  Great  Stone  Book  (Anstead),  Advanced  Text  Book, 
Physical  Geography  and  Hand  Book  (Page),  Earth  and  Man  (Guyot),  Physical 
Geography  (Somerville),  Manual  of  Geology  (Dana),  Sketches  of  Nature 
(Winchell),  Geology  of  the  Stars,  do..  Physical  Geography  of  the  Sea  (Maury), 
Roget's  Animal  and  Vegetable  Physiology  (Bridgewater  Treatise),  Vegetable 
World  (Figuer),  Structure  of  Animal  Life  (Agassiz),  Chemistry  of  Common 
Life  and  Agricultural  Chemistry  (Johnson),  Johnson's  Turner's  Chemistry, 
Natural  Laws  of  Husbandry  (Liebig),  Aspects  of  Nature  (Humboldt),  Ana- 
lytical Class  Book  of  Botany,  Wonders  of  Heat  (Cozin),  Prehistoric  Nations 
(Baldwin),  Carthage  and  her  Remains  (Davis),  Civil  Policy  in  America 
(Draper),  Chips  from  a  German  Workshop  (Max  Muller)-. 


♦   % 


